Chapter 7
Chapter Seven
June 2024
I t had been a surprise to learn Bruce Tyler had a sailboat. Seeing him at a distance for so many years, both as parents of sons in the same grade, Stella had assumed him to be slightly nerdy, bookish, and unathletic. But when he’d first taken her out on his sailboat— Karina— she’d seen him for the complex, resilient, and powerful man he truly was. Nobody was simple. Everyone had a secret side.
Now, beneath the beating Nantucket sun, Bruce whipped up and down the boat, unleashing sails to the winds, securing them so that they were scooped out of the harbor and into a world of blue, blue, blue turquoise, cerulean, and everything in between. They’d been officially a couple for a little more than a year at that point—after an awkward yet sweet dating season between January and April 2023. They’d wanted to take things slow. It offered them more stability.
Still, Bruce hadn’t told Stella where his first wife had gone. It felt like a crater between them. What did it mean that he didn’t offer up that information readily? Did it mean he was still hung up on her? Or did it mean that something so heinous had occurred between them to break them up that he didn’t want to revisit it?
It confused her far more than she wanted it to. She wanted to put the past to bed. She wanted to move on.
Or did she? She’d written that entire memoir about her past. Maybe that meant she wanted to live in the past for good.
Stella was draped along a cushioned chair on deck, wearing a white bikini. Her dark hair whipped around her in the wind. Her skin was warm.
“Look at her!” Bruce called from the ropes. “The soon-to-be-famous novelist!”
Stella laughed and tried to pull her hair into a messy bun. But she lost control of her hair tie. It fluttered into the ocean and was lost forever. She imagined it dropping to the bottom.
The past year and a half had been exhausting, exhilarating, heart-wrenching, and creative. It had taken her to the darkest depths of herself. Together with her agent, Gwen, she’d edited A Brief Greek Love and then sent it off to twenty-five editors at publishing houses across the United States and the United Kingdom. Together, she and Gwen had waited, biting their nails with nerves. And then, in September of 2023, an editor at a publishing house reached out to say A Brief Greek Love was one of the most beautiful books she’d ever read. She wanted to bring it into the world. “But we need a new title,” she’d said via Zoom.
She couldn’t believe it. She was going to be a published author.
At forty-three, she would achieve something that felt beyond her wildest dreams.
Bruce took the sailboat to a beautiful cove on the opposite side of the island. From there, they could see one of the more exclusive and massive mansions on the island, which a very wealthy actor was rumored to have purchased earlier this year. The lawn surrounding it was the lushest green Stella had ever seen. It was as though they’d invented a new, better type of grass that “normal” people weren’t allowed to know about yet.
Bruce secured the boat with an anchor and popped a bottle of champagne. He poured into two flutes and handed one to Stella. He then sat beside her and raised his glass.
“To a beautiful summer,” he said. “And to finally getting your book into the world.”
Stella kissed him and took a sip. Bubbles cascaded across her tongue.
A moment of silence passed between them. Stella’s heart pounded. These silences had been happening more and more lately. It was often difficult to figure out what was going on in Bruce’s head. He was quiet. He didn’t often show his hand.
“I meant to tell you,” Stella said, breaking through the quiet. “Aunt Esme has agreed to host my book launch at the Sutton Book Club.”
Bruce smiled. “Of course she did. She couldn’t say no to that.”
“But it’s really the perfect spot for it. It’s where Aunt Esme urged me to take up writing in the first place,” Stella explained. “It feels like it’s meant to be.”
“You’ll ask your cousin to cater the event?” Bruce asked.
“If she’s up for it,” Stella said, thinking of Rebecca, who’d returned to Nantucket after her husband’s death.
In fact, Rebecca wasn’t the only Sutton who’d returned to Nantucket. Uncle Victor, Bethany, and Valerie were all back, too—facing the ghosts of their past. It was rumored they’d come because Esme’s husband Larry had died and left her alone. Stella had done what she could for Esme, cooking her meals to put in the freezer and sitting with her at the Sutton Book Club. But Esme was heartbroken.
Stella had never lost a great love to death before. She couldn’t fathom it. Sometimes, it terrified her so much—the fact that she’d let herself fall for someone again.
Although she and Bruce hadn’t said, they loved each other. Not yet.
It’s better to take things slow.
Bruce and Stella enjoyed a picnic on the water, listening to the radio, eating strawberries and sandwiches, and finishing another glass of champagne. Stella had plans that evening with her children, and Bruce had also mentioned getting back for something. Stella assumed it was work-related. She was never entirely clear on what he did for money. But he seemed to make a lot of it and was well-respected. That was enough for her.
Just before Bruce unleashed the sails to take them back to the harbor, Stella got a text from Gwen with a final photograph of the book, newly printed from the publisher.
GWEN: Isn’t it the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen?
Stella’s heart broke at the cover. After some back-and-forth with the publisher, they’d agreed on a turquoise-blue cover with the outline of a woman, a man, and a Greek village behind them. It was sensational. Gwen had already said she thought it would “jump off the shelves.”
Stella watched Bruce take them home, his capable, strong hands moving like powerful birds as he worked the sails.
It reminded her of one of the chapters of her memoir. When she closed her eyes, it was like she was right back there on the Aegean Sea, twenty-one years old, her legs long and tanned, her arms open to the variables of whatever came next.
Bruce hadn’t yet read the memoir.
But sometimes, it terrified her to think of him reading it.
What would he say? Would he say, You don’t love me as much as you loved him?
She worried it was obvious.
She worried that the enormous feelings in her memoir wouldn’t translate to the rest of her life.
She worried the memoir made the rest of her life seem hollow.
“What are you thinking about?” Bruce asked as he skidded them against the dock and secured the ropes.
Stella got up and laced her arms around his waist. She kissed him. “I’m thinking about how happy I am.”
Because she was happy. She really was.
Bruce’s eyes were distant again. She tried to peer deeply into them and make sense of what he was thinking.
“You ready to go?” Bruce asked.
Stella put on her dress, grabbed her bag, and walked with Bruce down the docks. Tourists and Nantucket locals milled along the boardwalk, eating ice cream cones, adjusting baseball caps, and talking about their evenings ahead. There were dinner reservations. There were parties at mansions. There were weddings to prepare for.
Nantucket was awash in celebration. It was summertime.
Stella agreed to meet Logan, Chloe, Matt, and Mandy at the burger restaurant on the opposite end of the Nantucket Historic District. She got there a few minutes before seven, which gave her time to kill with her phone, staring at the book cover of her memoir. The decision to re-title the memoir to The Athens Affair was a funny one. But when the publisher had said it would “sell, sell, sell,” she hadn’t been able to fight back. She wanted it to sell, sell, sell, didn’t she?
She heard Chloe before she saw her. She cackled happily, telling her brother something that had happened at swim practice the other day. Logan appeared a second later, bounding around the corner. They were both taller than Stella—Logan was six foot two, and Chloe was five foot eight. Stella, at five-five, found herself peering up at them.
Matt came around the corner after them with his phone against his ear. There was no Mandy in sight.
Stella got up to hug her children and her ex-husband. Matt got off the phone with a quick, “See you later,” then said, “Hey there,” to Stella in a tone that suggested he was disappointed about something.
“You got our normal table!” Chloe said happily.
Stella hadn’t realized it, but she had. This was the same booth they’d sat at as a family for the better part of ten years—even before the divorce. She’d gone to it without thinking.
“Everything okay?” Stella asked Matt as they sat down.
Chloe and Logan were distracted by something. A story about someone from their high school.
“Mandy had to go to the city today,” Matt said. “She got stuck in traffic and missed her meeting.”
Stella winced. “I’m sorry to hear that.”
Matt waved his hand. “I just feel bad for her. She works so hard. I always want everything to work out perfectly.”
“Nothing ever does,” Stella said.
The server came by to take their order. Nobody had to look at the menus to know what they wanted. Stella opted for a burger with blue cheese and a glass of Diet Coke. They got fries for the table because they always did. Matt ordered a light beer.
“What did Esme say?” Matt asked as soon as the server left.
Stella’s heart filled. “She wants to host the book launch!”
Chloe, Logan, and Matt cheered.
For a moment, Stella thought, These are my people. These are the only people in the world who really and truly love me.
And for a soft and sad moment, she thought, Why did Matt and I get divorced? We built a family together! We built a life!
But she tried not to let that sorrow play out across her face.
“How many copies should I buy?” Matt was asking about the memoir.
Stella laughed. “I just want to get on the New York Times bestseller list. Can you get me there?”
“Ten thousand? Twenty?” Matt asked.
“Are you going to have to read from the book?” Chloe asked.
Stella’s cheeks were warm. She tried to guess what she might read from the memoir. She hadn’t yet considered that Chloe and Matt would all be in the audience, listening in. Probably Bruce would be, too. Was she really going to read about her first love in front of all the people from her current life? Was she going to die of embarrassment?
“Probably,” Stella said.
Maybe she could just read the beginning. The beginning wasn’t too emotional. It was just about a girl on an adventure.
Chloe was sixteen now. Stella supposed she was about to have adventures of her own.
Stella sipped her Diet Coke and turned her attention to Logan. “How did it go with your roommate?”
Logan looked nervous. “He seems cool, I guess. He lives in Pennsylvania.”
“What’s his major?” Matt asked.
“Mathematics,” Logan said.
“Like you,” Matt offered.
Logan raised his shoulders. “I guess that’s why they paired us up.”
“You can help each other with your homework,” Stella said.
Logan shrugged again. Stella found it difficult to gauge how Logan felt about going away to college in August. It probably meant he would miss her book launch (which was probably a good thing). But she wanted him to feel confident and good about going away. She didn’t want him to look back at his past on Nantucket with any regrets or fears.
The food arrived. Chloe went to the bathroom to wash her hands, and Matt got up to get some napkins. This left just Stella and Logan at the table. She reached over to touch his hand.
“We’re going to miss you, you know. But we’re going to visit all the time,” she said. “And you can come home, too. We’ll pick you up.”
Logan stared down at his burger and didn’t answer her.
That took Stella back to age eighteen, too. She’d been terrified to leave home. She’d cried herself to sleep when she’d first gotten to college.
And then, she’d opened herself up to the rest of her life. And she hadn’t regretted a thing.
She knew Logan would find a way to do that, too. Eventually.
Suddenly, a text buzzed through Stella’s phone. Without thinking about it, she pulled it out of her purse.
It was from Bruce.
It read:
We need to talk.
Stella’s heart dropped like a stone into her stomach.